They Would Meet Again
by GoldenNinde
Summary: A 20 year old Booth sees a 15 year old Brennan across the street. "She forgot. Time and pain made his features blurry until all she remembered were dark eyes and his voice, stealing the first time she felt beautiful" Ch2: AGAIN IS NOW Brennan's POV
1. They Would Meet Again

_**Hel**__**loooo! Happy New Year everyone!**_

_**So, it's like the description says… this idea just strode into my head. If it's been done before (I haven't read it, but then again I haven't read every B/B fic in the world) I apologise. I also apologise for the romanticism. I was feeling puckish.**_

_**What? What! So Caroline is the only one who can use that excuse?**_

**THEY WOULD MEET AGAIN**** – by GoldenNinde**

The first thing he noticed was the flash of sunlit crimson hair. She was laughing, for a reason he found himself desperate to know. When they met again, fifteen years later, he would marvel at the change, the joy turned to temperance.

The passion she carried with her always, that ability to feel so keenly would still be there all that time later… but he would realise it would be some time before the uninhibited laughter came back. He would vow to himself to make her laugh just like she'd laughed as a teenager.

He'd remember her after fifteen years.

She wouldn't recognise him.

The fifteen year old girl stood with a group of friends. She hadn't been talking, and she clearly wasn't the centre of attention. But there was something about her… she stood out, and not just because she was much taller than the other girls. There was the bright hair, the astonishing eyes, and despite her long limbs (to which she couldn't be used to yet) there was a grace in her movements. This grace would only grow in time.

The beauty wasn't quite there yet; she was too thin, her clothes weren't fashionable and she wore no make up, but there was certainly _something_ about her face. The strong jaw, the elegant eyebrows… yes, there was certainly something.

He'd been walking home, dreading what he'd find there, but now he simply stood in the middle of the pavement, staring at the other side of the road. She was much younger than him, she couldn't be older than fifteen or sixteen.

And then one of her friends whispered something in her ear. The girl seemed to shrink momentarily, perhaps from the attention. The laughter was gone, and with surprise he realised just how shy and serious she looked now. But as the other girl's words registered… a transformation occurred. She took a breath and seemed to steel herself to do something, to draw courage.

And then she turned to look straight at him, hands on hips. Her chip went up, the look on her eyes was no longer muted, she looked defiant and strong.

"What?" she shouted. All her friends stopped talking now and stared at her. They clearly hadn't expected this, any more than he had. He wondered how often she let them see this side of her.

"Are you talking to me?" he couldn't help but let humour slip in his tone.

"Yeah. Please stop looking at me."

There was a frenzy of giggles at this, but he didn't hear them. Her voice was rich and deep, like velvet soaked and dripping in honey.

"I wasn't."

"Yes you were."

"No I wasn't." he felt like a five year old, even though he was four times that age.

"I have eye witnesses. Proof."

"Well I'm happy for you, really, but-"

He stopped talking because she began crossing the road.

"What are you doing?"

She walked up to him and now that she was closer, he saw the fear in her eyes. She was ignoring it admirably, however.

"You were."

Yes, she should fear him. But not just because he was older, taller, and seemed unable to shed that menacing air about him. She should be afraid because he was bad. Tainted. Dangerous.

"Listen, kid-" he began.

"Kid? Are you serious?"

He chuckled.

"Yeah. Kid."

"Look, objectively I'd say I'm not the best looking girl in my group, so there's obviously another reason for you to be staring. And I'd like to know it."

"Say the magic word." She didn't think she was pretty? Suddenly she looked more beautiful.

"Please, I'd like to know it."

He stared down at her and felt something stir inside of him. He'd been walking home hating each step which took him closer there, and now he felt slightly giddy and good humoured.

"You-"

"Marco!"

She spun around the instant the word reached her ears, her face glowing with something… pride?

"Polo!" she shouted at a boy parking a motorcycle. Boyfriend? He looked older than her. She turned away from the other boy to face him once more, and now she looked more comfortable. The fear was gone.  
Suddenly he felt annoyed.

"Hey, is everything okay, Tempe?" the other boy called, seeing her standing in front of him.

"Everything's _fine_, Russ." She replied. "I can take care of myself."

"What? Is he bothering you?" the boy began walking towards them, looking angry.

"Hey, don't go protective elder-brother on me now, okay?"

The annoyance faded, replaced by an irrational happiness.

"I'm leaving, okay? Relax, kid." He couldn't hide a wide grin as he said it, knowing it would annoy her.

"_Don't_ call me kid."

Yep, he'd been right.

"And you didn't answer my question." She added.

He eyed her brother, who was almost there, and decided that he was never going to see her again. So, what the hell, right?

"You _are_ the best looking girl." The words came out without warning, and as he said them he realised they were true.

"What?"

"That's the reason I was looking at you."

The look on her face then would burn in the back of his eyelids whenever he closed them during the next few years. It was simply… incredible.

Her eyes seemed to melt into liquid sapphires, the mouth curved upwards and her cheeks reddened, and she seemed torn between surprise, pleasure, pride and something too complicated to define.

She looked down, then back up at him with her mouth slightly open as if to ask something else, then decided not to and ran to her brother, waving goodbye to her stunned friends on the other side of the road.

He grinned again, and walked away.

For the next fifteen years, until they were introduced properly (and he would almost go into shock when he recognised her), he'd remember her face, her innocence and also her bravery.

He'd momentarily forget, though, during his worst times. Gambling and drinking, especially the former. The outlines of her face would blur as the machines clicked and the coins rained down.

She would seem to fade during long stake outs, too, and the moment his finger squeezed that trigger the face would completely disappear.

But then, slowly…

Her smile would come back.


	2. Again Is Now

_**This wanted to be written. Hope you like it ;)**_

_**And Thursday is getting closer and closer and closer…**_

_**.**_

_**.**_

**AGAIN**** (IS NOW) – by GoldenNinde**

She slept and her mind dreamt. Her face looked clear of thoughts for once, and her body was relaxed, but she never ceased to think, to calculate, to imagine…

_He'd been so amused. Smiling like it was nothing,__ standing there looking confident, taller and stronger and older than she was, and looking dangerous. He scared her at first, but when she sensed that it wasn't danger that he wore like a cloud over his head, it got easier to fake a bravery she didn't feel._

"_Are you talking to me?" he__'d looked like he was trying not to laugh… but she trusted her classmate's judgement, and concurred with her statement: the boy had been looking at her._

_She __walked over to him, being 'in control' and 'confronting the problem' so it would go away._

_Right, sure._

_As her mind posited scenarios (in which she mostly ended up having an extra training session for her black belt karate exam) the irrelevant thought of just how incredibly good looking he was distracted her. Better than any of the boys in her school, even Andy Lister._

Her hand clutched the sheet, her body anticipating this moment: when the sunlight threw his face into sharp relief and every detail could be examined… her closed eyes seemed to squint against the darkness, so that she could see better.

But she'd forgotten. Time and pain had made his features blurry until all she remembered were dark eyes, taking in her appearance. And his voice, telling her she was pretty. He'd stolen the first time she _felt_ pretty.

"Don't_ call me kid. And you didn't answer my question."_

"_You _are_ the best looking girl."_

And he'd stolen her first beautiful smile, too, although she didn't know this. She only knew that she'd never been lost for words before. Speechless.

In her dream, she was the fifteen year old girl looking up at the boy who would become the object of her fantasies of rescue. He would saved her from strange houses and beds that weren't hers. He would save her from hostile people who wanted money. It didn't matter where, just that he did.

When she'd been cold under the thin blankets of someone else's home which was never hers, she'd wished he was there again, with a passion she hadn't known she was capable of feeling before. Sometimes he climbed in through the window, or maybe banged on the door and demanded she leave with him.

They had met only a month before her parents disappeared, and his memory became like a beacon of hope which took very long to extinguish.

Even though, eventually, it was.

Her eyebrows contracted in a frown, and her grip on the sheet was stronger now, knuckles white and tense as the memories of waiting for him to come swirled around her like leaves caught in a wind. He'd never come. No matter how much her heart had beat faster with every creak in the floorboards, never in fear but in desperate longing… She'd been alone.

Russ had never come either. Russ, the brother who'd left without glancing back.

But Russ was no longer a painful thought. Now Russ brought happy things, even though she'd hated him with a passion she hadn't known she was capable of feeling either.

The faceless boy standing in the street in her dream turned serious, and took a step toward her. As if to remind her he was there and that she shouldn't get lost in thoughts of before.

"_That's the reason I was looking at you."_

_She looked down, __then back up at him with her mouth slightly open as if to ask something else__, and then… _she shouted.

Because his face… his devilish, handsome face was…

"No!"

And with the sound of her own voice, she woke.

"Bones!"

"Booth?"

She heard his voice before she saw the dark figure standing at the foot of her bed, shrouded in darkness. Otherwise things might have ended badly.

"You… you're _here_? What… what are you _doing_?" She pulled the sheet over her and let her eyes adjust to the dim light coming through the curtains.

"I'm sorry, I have the key you gave me, remember? Uh, I came to bring coffee and see if you wanted a ride to the site… we've got a case."

"Why didn't you wake me?"

"I was getting to that."

She wanted desperately to ask how long he'd been standing there. But she didn't, because it was forbidden by some rule or guideline of the 'unspoken yet always present' sort.

She thought about him, couldn't help but tear her eyes from him and now… now he'd stolen her memories as well? Because the face of the boy, the one she'd forever remember and yet always forget…

… had been Booth.

This had never happened before; usually the boy didn't have a face, or maybe she did see it but then forgot…

He was slowly taking over. He didn't leave a single aspect of her life untouched. Now he was the idealised prince from her adolescence too. Well, dammit, she shouldn't be surprised. He was everything else, why not this as well?

"Can you leave while I change?"

"Sure, Bones. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to scare you… or creep up on you like that."

"That's okay." She sat up and the sheet slid down to her waist.

His eyes raked over her, and suddenly he scrambled backward until he collided with the wall.

She looked down, but the nightshirt was in place. A little tight, yes, and maybe white could look translucent in certain lighting, but otherwise decent…

"Booth?"

"You know what, Bones?" he panted slightly, and had an arm against the wall as if to steady himself. "You were made to test me, and so far I'm _failing_."

And with these words he turned and fled, slamming the bedroom door behind him.

After she'd dressed in something proper, she emerged cautiously, hoping the moment had passed and she never had to feel like every particle of air separating their bodies shouldn't be there. Well, never _again_, anyway.

"Booth?"

He sat on the couch, rubbing his eyes as though he was trying to wake himself up.

"Yeah. Let's go."

As they walked outside and settled into a comfortable argument about why she couldn't drive, her mind churned…

… _made to test me, and so far I'm __failing…_

She thought of the boy in her dreams.

"_Are you talking to me?"_

"_Yeah. Please stop looking at me."_

"_I wasn't."_

"_Yes you were."_

"_No I wasn't"_

And she thought. She didn't have to think of Booth because if she simply let her mind wander it would invariably think of Booth on it's own.

"Are you serious?"

"Yeah. Let me drive."

"I won't, Bones."

"Yes you will."

"No I won't."

As she sat down in the passenger seat, letting him win (never losing. Temperance Brennan didn't lose), he stole another smile from her. One he didn't see, but that wasn't the point.

Because it didn't matter. Or at least, it _mattered_ and it also made sense, so her frustration at his secure grip on her life was gone.

She smiled because it was, somehow… _right_, that he was the boy she dreamt about.

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_**You know you want to. You WANT to push that button and write **__**about your thoughts… or… all right fine, maybe it's ME who really, really wants you to, but please review anyway!**_

_**Thursday is SO CLOSE! Aaaaaaaa!**_


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